Sergei Suvorov, the press secretary of the Military Industrial Company LLC, a reserve colonel, candidate of military sciences, talks about the Russian modernized armored personnel carrier BTR-82.
- We were given the task in July by the end of November to make two prototypes of such a machine (variants with a 14.5-mm machine gun and with a 30-mm automatic cannon). We made them, as promised, on November 30 both cars were rolled out of the shops and held a "photo session". Back in July, when an extended technical conference was held at the military-industrial complex on the territory of the Arzamas machine-building plant, the head of the GABTU, General A. Shevchenko, ordered to assign new names to the deeply modernized BTR-80 / 80A - BTR-82 and BTR-82A, respectively. And now the machines are ready for testing.
The need for such a modernization of the BTR-80 is long overdue. During our trips to the troops, we often heard from people operating our equipment that the BTR-80 is a wonderful machine, suits everyone, but we need armament drives, they did not even talk about the need to stabilize the armament, but simply it was only about drives.
Our designers went further. Now the BTR-82 has not only drives, but also a two-plane weapon stabilizer, a combined sight with independent stabilization of the field of view. In the variant with the 14.5 mm KPVT machine gun, a power supply system with a single belt for 500 rounds appeared, i.e. the crew no longer needed to reload the machine gun 10 times (10 boxes of 50 rounds, as was the case on the BTR-80).
The turret for both versions of the BTR-82 is unified, only the main weapon is different - either a large-caliber machine gun or a 30-mm automatic cannon.
In addition, the protection and living conditions were somewhat improved due to the use of anti-splinter lining and the installation of an air conditioner. The machine is equipped with new means of communication and orientation.
The mass of the car increased to 15 tons, so it was necessary to make changes to the design of the chassis and power plant. The armored personnel carrier uses a new 300 hp engine, reinforced chassis and transmission. The standard undercarriage of the BTR-80 was designed for a load of up to 15 tons, so a further increase in the mass of the machine was fraught with the failure of the elements of the undercarriage of the BTR and the loss of its mobility.
Even in a nutshell, the BTR-82 and BTR-80 differ in many design changes, so the assignment of a new index to the modernized armored personnel carrier is quite justified. It was also once with the T-55 tank after the modernization of the T-54B, with the T-90 after the modernization of the T-72BM, and this happened with the BTR-82.
